Cutting the Cord

I cut the cord with my cable television provider in October of 2010.  In my brief 27 year existence on this earth, I've been "blessed" to have had Comcast, TimeWarner and RCN as cable providers.  As a customer, I can unequivocally say that RCN is the best and cheapest of those three providers-RCN provided me with consistent service and billed me at a standard monthly rate.  As a result, I was pretty happy to be with RCN; they seemed to be at the top of their industry.

The crazy thing is that consistent service and standard rates do not generally result in a company being at the top of its industry.  Consistent service and standard rates are the rule, not the exception, except in the cable television industry.

Since there are a bunch of news articles and press regarding cutting the cable cord, I thought I'd share my thoughts: 

-  Netflix.  Yes, Netflix and other methods of streaming content are the wave of the future.  I ordered Netflix when I cut the cord (I didn't get the DVD plan) and purchased a Roku a few months later to stream Netflix directly to my television.  Netflix Instant was weak when I originally got it back in 2010.  It has come a long way, but has much further to go.  Still, streaming Netflix is incredible.  It takes me less than 30 seconds to decide what I want to watch, and then to have that content appear on my television in HD quality.  The more titles it gets, the more obsolete cable will become.  

-  I'll never go back.  I shouldn't say never, but I can't see myself signing up for cable again.  Watching commercials seems barbaric, and having 1000 channels and "nothing on TV" seems ludicrous.

-  Fuck you.  Fuck you cable companies, for making me subscribe to the Animal Planet, UPN, Oxygen and MTV.  I only want like 10 channels and you make me pay for 150.  Of those, 140 suck, so fuck you.  If I had the chance, and it wouldn't harm anyone, I would throw a rock through the CEO of Comcast's window.  Fuck you.

-  I would never invest in a cable company.  Those 10 channels realize who they are, and they are looking to cut their cord with the cable companies too.  I would like to have the broadcast channels (NBC, ABC, CBS and Fox), ESPN and possibly HBO.  ESPN and HBO already have apps that allow you to watch television on an iPad (ESPN's allows you to watch live television and HBO's lets you watch something basically as soon as its aired on HBO).  At the moment, ESPN and HBO require you to have a cable subscription in order to access the app.  That will unquestionably end at some point in the future. When it does, and when the broadcast channels can provide more consistent service with a pair of rabbit ears, cable's dominance will be at an end.  Alea iacta est.

-  Comcast may think that by buying NBC, its preserving cable's dominance.  They're wrong.  Either Comcast will do what every other channel is doing with content (i.e. come out with apps, allow live TV to be streamed, etc.) or NBC will die.

Cable companies should die.  They do not provide content, they merely provide distribution.  And a majority of what they distribute is something people don't want but have to pay for.  Once they have a method of getting only what they want, cable companies will perish, and it will be their own fault.  Cable companies have chosen not to adopt a la carte pricing.  They have chosen to double down on their bet that they can charge you $50 for 140 channels of garbage.  They have chosen not to live in this century. They deserve to die.